Akhmednabi Akhmednabiyev

Novoye Delo

July 9, 2013, in Semender, Russia

Akhmednabi
Akhmednabiyev, 53, deputy editor of the independent news outlet Novoye Delo and a contributor to the
independent regional news website Kavkazsky
Uzel, was shot dead at 7 a.m. outside
his house in Semender, a suburb of Makhachkala, capital of Dagestan,
according to regional and international
press
reports. A gunman shot at the journalist from a car before fleeing the scene, the
independent newspaper Novaya Gazetareported.

In
January 2013, Akhmednabiyev said he had been the target of threats and attacks.
He told authorities he had received threats via text messages and that an
unknown gunman fired several times at him outside his home, according to Novaya Gazeta and Kavkazsky Uzel. As in the fatal July attack, the assailant fired
from a car. Akhmednabiyev was not injured in the January attack, but his car
was damaged. News accounts said Akhmednabiyev later asked authorities for
protection, but the request was not granted.

Grigory
Shvedov, chief editor of Kavkazsky Uzel,
told CPJ that he believed the killing was politically motivated and connected
to Akhmednabiyev's journalism. Akhmednabiyev often covered sensitive topics, including
government corruption and abductions, arbitrary detentions, and torture of
local residents by local and federal authorities, according to Kavkazsky Uzel and other news reports. He accused the regional government of Akhvakh,
Dagestan, of corruption, and covered protests in which local residents urged
the governor to step down.

Shvedov
said local authorities refused to investigate the January 2013 attack as
attempted murder and instead classified it as a case of property damage.
Akhmednabiyev's lawyer contested the police response in court, and in April,
Dagestan's Supreme Court ordered regional prosecutors to reconsider the case
classification, according to Kavkazsky Uzel. In June, prosecutors
said they would address the case by July 10; Akhmednabiyev was killed one day
before that court hearing.

News reports also said that Akhmednabiyev's name had appeared on a "death
list" published anonymously and
distributed in the form of a handout in Makhachkala in September 2009. The
handout, which named
eight journalists among its targets, called for "destruction of the
bandits and revenge for police officers and peaceful citizens." In
December 2011, one journalist from that list, editor Gadzhimurad Kamalov, was murdered in Makhachkala.

Russia's
Investigative Committee, a federal agency tasked with solving grave crimes,
opened an investigation into Akhmednabiyev's killing and
released a statement that said it
considers journalism to be a likely motive. Regional prosecutors in Dagestan released
a statement saying they would reopen their probe into the January 2013 attack
against the journalist.